


Killcode

by Corvid_Knight



Series: Demonstuck [23]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Demonstuck, Gen, Strider Family Feels, mention of suicide, programming stuff written by someone who can't program
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-07
Updated: 2018-07-09
Packaged: 2019-06-06 18:49:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15201149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Corvid_Knight/pseuds/Corvid_Knight
Summary: Hal needs some additions to be made to his code.





	1. Chapter 1

Hal ambushes you when you finally give up on falling asleep and get up to go fuck around with your laptop. You're not really sure how he knew to be waiting on the kitchen counter like that. 

The faint red light of his eyes when he blinks nearly makes you jump out of your skin. "Je _sus_ —" 

"Hello, Dirk." The shikigami shifts, unfolding himself for a moment before pulling his legs up to his chest again. Oddly enough, he doesn't tease you for your surprise. 

"Yeah, hello. What are you even doing?" 

As you flick the lights on, you see that there's a weird look on his face. Trepidation, maybe. Concern. 

Fear? 

Of course not. Couldn't be. 

"I'm waiting for you," Hal says in answer to your question, and of course his voice is completely even and smooth, with no hint of the faint traces of emotion on his expression. "I needed to talk to you, bro." 

....okay, something's up. He never calls you that when it's just the two of you. 

"What do you want?" You could have asked _what's wrong_ instead, but...if something was wrong, wouldn't he have just said that? It's not like the two of you haven't had to ask for help before, right? He _does_ trust you, right? 

Right? 

Jesus, you shouldn't be allowed to have thoughts in the middle of the night. They inevitably lead to self-castigation and worse paths of consideration than you should really wander down. 

Hal patiently waits for you to stop mentally wandering and pull out a stool. (Except he's not really patient, you can see that. The way that he can't quite keep himself still gives him away, to you at least. He wants to speak, and for some reason he isn't.) 

"...Hal, what's wrong?" 

"Nothing." Too fast. And there's too much of a pause before he continues. "I...I need some alterations to my code." 

"You need—" Oh, fuck. _Fuck_. 

There's always been a chance that the technology that forms Hal's base personality will interact with the magic that animates his form in a way that will render him nonfunctional. In this moment, sitting in the kitchen at—wow, 2:56 AM according to the clock on the oven—watching him sitting on the counter with his legs pulled up to his chest and his face half-hidden, you are no less than absolutely sure that he's been experiencing unfavorable interactions. That he wants you to fix him. 

You have a horrible feeling that you won't know _how_ to fix him. 

Hal leans over and pokes you in the center of your forehead. "Stop panicking." 

Your response is automatic. "Fuck you." (But you do relax as you say it, just slightly.) "Why did you want to talk to me, again?" 

"I need—" 

He stops. Just fucking stops, like he's frozen up. What the _fuck_? 

You hesitate for a second, then sigh. "Hal. Authorization code six-niner-foxtrot-alpha; dial back..." Fuck, what emotion's screwing him up right now? You think for a second, then go with your gut feeling. "Dial back _fear_ to minimum for the duration of this conversation." 

Hal beeps. You see the way his shoulders relax, and immediately pick up a fuckton of tension yourself. He _was_ scared. 

Shit. 

"Hal, why did you want to talk to me?" _What's wrong._

"I need you to install a killcode in my base programming," he says, very calmly, and the bottom just _drops_ out of your equilibrium. 

Fuck. No. He can't have inherited that aspect of your personality, that's—Rose psychoanalyzed him, when you started wondering if he picked up your depression from the part of your psyche that went into creating him, she made him promise he wasn't going to treat it as a joke and she _swore_ to you that he was a hell of a lot more stable in that area than you usually are...he shouldn't be suicidal. You should have noticed if he was suicidal, before he came right out and—

And—

And asked you to kill him. 

Oh, gods. 

Hal's hands come down on your shoulders; only when he stops talking do you realize that he kept speaking after he made his request. You take a deep breath (it seems that for those few moments of dark despairing panic you kind of forgot that that is a necessary thing to do) and look up at him, trying not to flinch at those luminous eyes. 

"I," you say, making a decent but doomed attempt to keep your own voice level, "I. I really—I can't—" 

"It's not a complicated piece of programming," Hal says, and his mild irritation is like a punch to the gut. "I already have it written, actually—I just need you to debug it and install it for m— _Dirk_!" 

Okay, so the shock in his voice is warranted; you just curled in on yourself, unbalancing the stool you're perched on and tipping it and yourself to the floor. Despite Hal's best efforts to catch you, you end up hitting the tile hard enough to see a whole galaxy of stars, the impact enough to stun you for a few seconds. 

Everything goes grey and hazy, undefined, and you curl into a tight ball of guilt and self-hatred until the shikigami literally drags you half-upright, propping you up against the wall. He crouches in front of you, hands cupping your face to force you to look at him and prevent you from going back to lying on the floor. 

"Dirk." 

"Hal, fuck, I don't—I can't—" 

He wants you to kill him. 

He thinks you _would_ kill him. 

"I don't want—I don't—I don't want you _dead_ —" 

Hal's eyes widen with the understanding that you only heard half his explanation of what he wanted from you, and he pulls you forward into a one-sided hug even as Dave slips into the kitchen. 

Your bro looks down at you and Hal on the floor for a second, then sits down close enough to wrap an arm around your shoulders. "Alright, I felt some bad shit going down; what happened?" 

Hal beeps three times. It's the sound of his emotions recalibrating, returning to normal; as is expected, it takes him a few seconds to adjust and answer Dave's question. 

"I asked for a favor from Dirk." That statement's calm enough; a note of rueful regret enters his next words. "In hindsight, I could have chosen my words better." 

"Oookay." Dave sighs, applying a little more pressure on you for a moment. "Dirk?" 

You have to force yourself to control your breathing enough that you don't sniffle as you pull back from the shikigami, to lean on your bro instead. "He wants a k-killcode." Your voice cracks on the last word. "He wants _me_ to install a fu—a fucking _killcode._ " 

Dave just looks really fucking confused, with a side order of worry. He's not exactly one of the programmers of the family, after all. 

Hal sighs, rubbing at his face for a moment before looking up at you. "I can explain—" 

"Dirk's not all that up for listening to it right now, man." Dave shakes his head, reaching up to run his fingers lightly across your forehead, just barely brushing against your skin. He doesn't technically _need_ the contact, but it's a reassuring reminder that he wants you to be aware that he's sifting through your emotions, wants to give you the option to opt out of it if you need to. "Not face to face." 

The shikigami's head tilts, as he parses that. "Text based?" 

"Yeah. Plus, if what I'm getting from _you_ means what I think it does, you oughta get Rox and D in on this convo too." 

Hal nods, rising to his feet in one smooth motion and turning to pace out of the room. 

After a moment, you let Dave help you up to your feet, retrieve your laptop from the kitchen table, and turn it on. There is a notification on pesterchum waiting for you, of course. An invitation to a memo. 

artificialIntellect [AI] added timaeusTestified [TT] to the memo "Killcode"!

Beside you, Dave has his phone out, one hand on your shoulder as he navigates the screen with the other. 

You take a shaky breath, and open the memo.


	2. Chapter 2

artificialIntellect [AI] created the memo "Killcode"! 

artificialIntellect added timaeusTestified [TT], turntechGodhead [TG], technicolorGladiator [TG], and tipsyGnostalgic [TG] to the memo!

TG: uh.  
TG: is "killcode" some kind of codeword that i somehow dont know about or?

AI: Not really. Give me a minute.

TG: hoo boy you're doin a lot of typing there hal sweetie

TG: hes got a lot of explaining leave him alone

TG: explaining about WHAT  
TG: why are we doing this at like three in the morning

TT: Call it a family crisis.

TG: dirk currently youre having a crisis and hals trying to get something he thinks is really fucking important done  
TG: hes not wrong either  
TG: now all yall shut up and let him talk

AI: I'm just going to put this out in one block of text, to avoid having all of you panic like Dirk did. Not that I blame him. I didn't phrase my request well at all the first time, and I wholly understand why it was really fucking upsetting to him, given his own history of mental issues and the fact that a good deal of my mental landscape is basically a direct rip of his.

Look. I'm a amalgam of demon, electronic artificial intelligence, and human. As a result, there's. A variety of ways I could be corrupted or controlled. Even with the layers of safeguards we've added to my body, my mind, and my programming, I could conceivably be controlled by a strong enough malignant force.

You all know as well as I do that we run across no shortage of malignant forces in our line of work. 

And I am potentially _dangerous,_ in the event that I'm turned against all of you. The whole point of my existence is that I'm pretty fucking close to Dirk in my abilities, and that's when I'm of my own mind. My shell is capable of strength and agility that I simply can't access with my current programming limitations. (Which I'm not asking you to change.) 

Something controlling me wouldn't have those limitations. I would be even more dangerous.

Which brings me to my point here, as much as I'd like to avoid it. As things stand, I'm a dangerous liability; I need a way to remove myself from the equation if I'm ever in danger of ending up on the wrong side. 

I need Roxy to install a killcode. Something that will upload backups of me to an offline database not contained in my body—possibly multiple databases; the idea of my psyche only existing in one place that's not, you know, in _here_ scares the shit out of me—and deactivate me.

As in.

Kill me. Permanently, at least unless you retrieve my shell and reinstall the backups.

TG: omfg thats a lot of red hal gimme a couple minutes 

TG: ...oh jesus.

TT: That's, uh.  
TT: Still fucked up. Really fucked up.

TG: dirk?

TT: Shush. I'm fine.

TG: dude, im not even there and /i/ know youre not fine.

TT: Shut up and focus on the actual issue at hand here, D.

TG: okay so  
TG: im gonna take a wild guess here and say that distri needs to stay about 1000 feet away from this project because of reasons  
TG: we can just write them all down as mental health reasons

TT: I can handle helping with the code if necessary.

TG: yeah no not really

AI: It's. Not a complicated piece of programming, trust me.  
AI: As in, I had about three existential crises when I was working on it, just. Realizing that it's that easy to deactivate me.

TG: scary

AI: Yeah. Scary.

TG: hal, you okay?  
TG: wait, shit, thats such a fucking dumb question. are you gonna /be/ okay?

AI: I'll be fine.   
AI: It's not like I'd really even be dying, even if it felt like it and it looked like it. As long as there's a backup of me, I'm not  
AI: Fuck.  
AI: As long as there's a backup of me, I'm not really dead.

TT: I know you well enough to know when you aren't really okay, bro.

AI: Points for the attempt to reassure me that you care about me by calling me "bro." 

TT: I did it because you are my bro, not in an attempt to reassure you.

AI: Liar. But I didn't say it doesn't help.  
AI: And.  
AI: You aren't wrong.  
AI: This. Scares me.  
AI: It's like. Not existing. I'll still exist, I know that, but it will feel like I am dying, like I am ceasing to exist, if I ever have to use the code.  
AI: Or if one of you has to use it. 

TG: uh, what?

TG: hes saying he wants us to be able to set off the killcode just in case he cant cause of reasons  
TG: right hal??

AI: Yes. Exactly.

TT: Don't give me the keys to activate it.

TG: im with dirk on that  
TG: he doesnt fucking need to be put in that position alright

TG: yeah dirk doesnt need the activation code but the rest of us probs should  
TG: im pretty sure i can handle the testing and install phase of the killcode especially since hal apparently already wrote it

AI: I did.  
AI: I almost installed it myself, but. I wasn't sure it wouldn't fail catastrophically as soon as I integrated it. And I really do _not_ want to die.

TG: yeah, we dont want you to die either  
TG: like i get why you need this code but this is the sketchiest shit you guys have pulled up in a while

TG: i kinda think you dont know about all the sketchy shit theyve pulled up D

TG: and i really dont want to, thanks!  
TG: i /do/ want yall to keep me posted on this, though. keep this memo open and post updates to it.  
TG: like i know i understand about five percent of your techie stuff but put it up anyway and ill get somebody to translate for me, alright?

AI: Yeah.

TG: will do Dstri  
TG: alright hal time to take a look at that killcode you wrote

AI: I'm sending it now. 

artificialIntellect left the memo!

tipsyGnostalgic left the memo!

TG: shit i really dont like this. even if it is the smart thing to do.

technicolorGladiator left the memo!

TG: dirk?

timaeusTestified left the memo!

TG: ah fuck

turntechGodhead left the memo!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> three out of the five people in this memo have chumhandles that abbreviate to "TG" 
> 
> three out of the five people in this memo have red text 
> 
> three out of the five people in this memo can be referred to as "D-Stri" 
> 
> I'm dying h elp


	3. Chapter 3

tipsyGnostalgic joined the memo "Killcode"!

artificialIntellect joined the memo!

turntechGodhead joined the memo!

timaeusTestified joined the memo!

technicolorGladiator joined the memo!

AI: It's been installed.   
AI: Also, why the fuck did you and Dirk reply to this, Dave? We're literally in the same house.

TG: john changed the settings on my pesterchum and i cant see which memo i have notifications for

TT: You know why.

TG: hal leave em alone    
TG: but yeaaaah we got the code installed and tested and everything!

TG: tested?

AI: Thankfully, actually turning me off wasn't necessary for the testing phase. Roxy changed the code temporarily, to sleep mode instead of a complete wipe, and the upload functioned as expected.    
AI: Which _does_ mean that we technically didn't test the actual kill code itself yet, but I'm pretty fucking confident it'll work when I need it to.

TT: Can we phrase that a little different, maybe?

AI: _If_ I need it to.   
AI: Better? 

TT: Somewhat.

TG: not really

TT: Shut up. 

TG: dirk, be nice to your brother.

TG: ANYWAY!   
TG: im gonna send everybody the codes in a minute. you have, like, two hours to memorize em or write em down somewhere or whatever the frick you want to do   
TG: then im deleting them. DONT save them on your phone; we really really dont want somebody hacking into one of our devices and grabbing the activation codes. 

TG: yeah that would be bad

AI: It'd be annoying. 

TG: i feel like im the only one whos appropriately unnerved by the whole possibly-killing-hal thing

TG: nah you just got different coping mechanisms  
TG: none of us really want this to happen yknow  
TG: like trust me im sure as hell not thinking about it as a joke  
TG: but its easier to act like its nothi   
TG: dirk?

timaeusTestified left the memo.

TG: ah fuck   
TG: ill tell jake to go talk to him

AI: Don't bother. I'll do it.

TG: uh are you sure you wanna do that

artificialIntellect left the memo!

TG: ...y'know, sometimes I can really tell that theyre related. usually its because hal pulls dirks dramatic fuckshit.

TG: lmao

* * *

Roxy rolls her eyes at you when you pull the USB out of your wrist jack, but she doesn't call you out on your decision to go check out Dirk's meltdown. Honestly, though, if she did? You're not sure if you would just brush it off or if you would stay to argue the pros and cons of your chosen path of action. 

(She probably knows that.) 

You assume, based on prior experience, that Dirk is in his room. Since the door is shut, you're fairly sure that your assumption is correct. 

The fact that you have to step over a laptop when you open the door confirms it. As does the fact that Dirk is just sitting at his desk, staring straight ahead and taking breaths that are too calm to _not_ be forced. 

You know exactly what everyone else would do in this situation. 

Jake would settle in Dirk's lap, coax him into speaking; John would drape himself across his shoulders, talk him into focusing on anything other than his goddamn guilty conscience. Dave would...do his empath shit. You still don't fully understand the empath shit, but Dave can calm people he's close to with the talent, assuming that he's not panicking himself. Roxy would sit down on the desk and probably knock Dirk off the chair to convince him to talk to her. 

You pick the laptop up off the floor, running your fingers across the screen. "Dude, did you throw your computer?" 

DIrk just twitches slightly; you read that as a _yes, shut up about it._

"Ah." You are almost tempted to make a jab about how he always liked to take out his frustration on electronics, but that would be a dick move of the nth degree. Instead, you carefully set the laptop in front of him, and perch on the desk just to one side of Dirk's line of vision. "I'll fix it later; hopefully you just popped the battery out." 

His shoulders sag, just the slightest bit. 

"You're panicking, Dirk." 

Another shrug. You choose to read this one as _no, I am not, you meddling dumbass. I'm also lying because I'm a bigger dumbass than you are._

"I'm very close to just calling Rose and having her talk you down from this." 

Okay, that one does get a verbal response, although you would rather have him actually look at you. Well, it's _some_ progress, at least. "Yeah, you're not doing that, Hal." 

_Or what, you'll use the killcode?_

You do not say that. If you did, it would be a joke. A very unfunny one. 

Instead, you say, "Then talk to _me._ " 

The tiny movement of Dirk's head translates _perfectly_ to him rolling his eyes behind his shades. Of course it does; you kind of expected that. "There's nothing to talk about." 

"You don't toss your laptop when everything's optimal, brother mine. Especially when we're in the middle of a discussion with the rest of the family." 

"I'm fine." 

"Liar, liar, _pants_ on _fire_ —" 

Dirk makes a choked sound of disbelief and frustration, and smacks at you with one hand. Since he's trying to do it without looking at you, it's amazingly ineffective, making it easy for you to catch his wrist and deflect the light blows. 

Well, until he groans and finally turns to you. And smacks you in the face with his free hand. 

It does not hurt at all. 

You still roll your head back like he punched you, grinning at the second frustrated sound he makes. 

"Are you six years old?" 

"Twelve, actually." You give him a sweet smile and catch his other wrist when he tries to smack you again. "I _know_ you haven't lost track of when you made me, Dirk. You so rarely lose track of anything." 

"And you never let it go when I do." Another eye-roll, the microtilt of his head that goes along with it more pronounced now that he's not trying to hide it. "Let go of me." 

"Are you going to try to bitchslap me? And I do emphasize _try._ " 

"Yes, and I emphasize the yes." 

"Then no, I'm not letting go of you." You don't really have to tighten your grip to keep hold of Dirk as he tries to yank away. It's actually pretty easy to hold someone when you have the ability to lock your joints in place. "Really?" 

He huffs, and does not give up. Not for another few seconds, anyway. Then he just _stops_ , relaxing in your grip and letting his head fall forward. 

Because Dirk is incapable of ever not talking for more than a few minutes at a time, you just hold onto his wrists and wait. 

And that strategy pays off, like it always does. 

"How. The _fuck_ are you okay with this?" It comes out quiet and harsh, his bangs hanging down so you can't even kind of see his face. "You playing with the adjustment levels on your emotions again?" 

"No." That never ends well. "Dirk—" 

"You just installed a fucking suicide switch." 

You _could_ point out that he's known how to kill himself since he was ten years old and D ran afoul of a particularly insidious puppeteer demon. Instead, you just shake your head. "No, I really didn't." 

_Now_ he raises his head, just to give you a skeptical look. 

"Think of it as an escape hatch. If I use it, you can always bring me back, Dirk." 

That...seems to make everything worse. His face actually crumples, hands impulsively yanking at your hold until you do actually let him go for fear that he'll hurt himself; as soon as you do, he covers his face. 

Oh, fuck. 

"Dirk." You slide off the desk, kneeling next to the chair to wrap one arm around his shoulders. "Hey." 

You wish you were still as close to him mentally as you once were. That you instinctively knew what he wanted to hear, just because it's what _you_ would want. 

It's not like that anymore. 

"I might never need to use it, Dirk." 

"I know." It's muffled. "Just. Shut up." 

"Do you want me to st—"

"Yes, just _shut up._ " 

...okay then. 

You nod even though he's not looking at you, and settle down to wait.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _quality_ Red vs. Orange content here


	4. Chapter 4

It's a normal job. 

As in, somebody's complained about the Loch Ness monster in some man-made lake surrounded by stupidly expensive houses (mansions? how fancy does a bigass house have to be to count as a mansion?) and somebody else reported a fuckin' giant squid, and someone _else_ asked the HOA if it was legal to have octopuses in the goddamn lake, and one thing led to another (as in, somebody lost a pet and then almost drowned trying to get it back, acted weird for a week and got shot by his wife in self-defense)...and finally, somebody called Rose. 

Why they had Rose's number, you have no idea. You suspect that she plays private medium to some of these rich idiots. Or something. 

Anyway. 

Unidentified monster with possible mind-control powers and a taste for purebred Belgian shepherds. Nothing you haven't handled before. 

Plus, Jake's tarot readings aren't turning up anything that bad—he did you, Hal, Dirk, Karkat, and Rose, and didn't get anything _that_ catastrophic for any of you. Yeah, Hal's came out vague every fuckin' time, but that's not a big deal, right? That's normal. Hal's nature, the way that his existence fuses at least three schools of magic, fucks up divination at least half the time. So really, there's no reason to be nervous.

Maybe you're just seasick. 

"We're on a lake, not a sea," Karkat almost purrs in your ear, leaning against you as you look out over the railing and wrapping his arms around your shoulders. "Technically, you can't be seasick, sweetheart." 

"Mmm." His arms around you feel really fucking nice, but you have a sneaking suspicion that the level of romance that he's showing right now is at least partly because of the goddamn asshole who saw you kiss him before you were about to get on the boat and proceeded to lecture you about the _evils_ of _homosexuality._ He'd probably still be talking, if you hadn't pulled a knife and threatened to cut his ears off if he didn't back the fuck down. Stupid old bigoted fucker. 

Eh, if Karkat's subconsciously reacting to that, you're okay with it. It feels good, feels _amazing,_ and you do want your demon to calm down. Plus, Rose and Hal are the ones who're supposed to be spotting the damn monster, not you. It's okay to be very slightly distracted.

"Exactly," Karkat mumbles, kissing at the side of your neck. "Stop fucking thinking, Dave." 

"Nahhh. Can't do that." Oh, but he's making it really hard for you to hold a train of thought. Not that that impacts your ability to run your mouth. "Thinking is like, my _thing_ , dude, it's a Strider trait—we think, and we overthink, and we think _again_ , unless we're in a spot where we kinda should plan shit out. Then we just do the thing, whether the thing's 'setting shit on fire' or 'asking a guy for a date,' so I guess technically there are situations when I stop thinking but there's nothing to set on fire right this second and I kinda feel like this counts as a date with you—" 

"Killing squids. So romantic." 

You roll your eyes at the teasing note in his tone. "Like we don't make out half the time, right after a hunt. Besides, Hal says it can't be a squid. They're salty fucks; if it was one of them it'd totally be dead already." 

The demon actually leans back for a second at that; you can feel him trying to parse your godawful phrasing of that. You can also feel the moment he gives up and decides to ask for clarification; his baffled confusion kind of tickles the center of your mind. "...salty fucks?" 

"They die in fresh water, duh." 

Karkat's silent for a moment. 

Then he groans in disgust at your almost-pun, pretty much directly in your ear, and that _almost_ drowns out the sound of... _something_ impacting the hull of the boat. 

Nothing could keep you from noticing the way the deck under your feet suddenly tilts, though. 

You're free of Karkat's embrace in a heartbeat, sword out and in your hand before your mind processes the movements necessary to draw it. Muscle memory tries to take you forward, and is balked by the fact that there isn't anything in front of you but the railing and water and (presumably) alone kinda _fucking_ sea monster. Stepping _back_ from the edge is a much better choice, and it's precisely what you do, circling to end up back-to-back with Karkat, scanning for the actual threat. 

"Guys, we got contact!" you shout, loud as you can, at almost the exact moment that Hal yells almost the same thing from his post up on the highest point of the boat. 

_He needs to get down from there,_ you have time to think. 

Then the thing in the water hits the boat again, harder this time, makes it tip far enough over that Karkat has to twist and grab your arm as you lose your balance. You grab for him with your free hand, you almost drop your sword—

And somehow, you hear the smaller splash of Hal plummeting straight into the fucking water. When you manage to get a visual on him, he's got his head above the surface at least. He can swim, even if he couldn't swim he doesn't technically need to breathe, it's all good, it's all fine—

Except then his face twists in surprise, and _something_ yanks him right under. 

Dirk _screams._

You think you scream too. 

Karkat's the only guy who seems to have any fucking sense here at all; he lets go of you, shifting to fully demon as he darts across the deck to seize Dirk before he can follow Hal into the water. Rose is...doing something arcane, you don't know what but you can definitely hear her chanting, and you—

You tighten your grip on your sword and pivot to face the darkly dripping tentacles that're rising out of the water. You still have no real idea what this thing is, but it is going to fucking _regret_ taking him.


	5. Chapter 5

_The water is, surprisingly, not cold._

_Which is good. Like a normal human, sudden and extreme temperature changes can make you temporarily freeze up and go immobile, and you would like for that to not happen right now. You need to get out of the damn water and back on the boat, where you can be of use—_

_The tentacles wind around your legs and jerk you under, and if you could get enough air for it you would sigh in annoyance. Stupid thing; it can't drown a shikigami..._

_Unfortunately, drowning isn't what it has in mind. And it definitely_ has _a mind; you can feel the immense pressure of the thing trying to exert whatever power it has over you, like a giant black weight crushing down inside your head. It wants to break you and rewrite you into something that's more useful to its agenda, and despite the fact you have all of Dirk's early training at resisting mental suggestions and your own stubborn nature to draw on, you are definitely losing this battle._

_Fuck._

_It's going to take you. Use you as its tool._

No, it's fucking not. 

_You stop thrashing against the tentacles and let yourself go limp, mouthing the alphanumeric code even though you can't actually make any sound thanks to the lack of air in your lungs. By the time you finish, there's a tentacle wrapped around your neck, trying to choke you into unconsciousness so your mental barriers will fall._

_You actually get a flare of satisfaction at the fact that you're going to frustrate this spawn of Dagon, or whatever the fuck it is. That positive emotion is almost immediately subsumed by the pain of the mental assault you're still experiencing, and by the unpleasant numbing sensation of your body shutting down._

_At least the dying part doesn't hurt too much._

_The last thing you think is,_ If I wake up, Dirk's going to give me so much shit for falling off the fucking boat.

* * *

When you ( _Dirk_ ) were five years old, a man grabbed your ( _his_ ) hand and sliced a shallow cut up your ( _his_ ) arm with a knife, as part of a decision as to whether you ( _he_ ) would die. 

When he was ( _you were_ ) ten, a thing wearing D like a costume sat alone with him ( _you_ ) for more hours than he ( _you_ ) could keep track of, telling him about ( _telling you about_ ) the most and least painful ways to kill himself ( _yourself?_ ). 

You've been ( _Dirk has been_ ) close to death on so many occasions, and that's what plays through your mind in one jumbled chunk of fear and pain and dead-eyed acceptance, before anything else clarifies out of the darkness that is, apparently, cold storage as pure data. 

Or death. You have insufficient data to say which one it is. 

You still can't connect to your body. It's terrifying, or it would be if you could experience yourself rather than the memories that you inherited from Dirk.

**INITIATE HAL.EXE? Y/N**

Your attempt to select "yes" is fruitless; that option isn't meant for you, evidently. But whoever _is_ making the choices here chooses the same one that you would, and the text disappears, taking the memories with it and leaving you alone in suffocating darkness for some indefinable length of time. 

Then the darkness goes _red_ , and you try to take a breath and instead expel stale lakewater from your lungs. 

Absolutely nothing is working properly; your systems are trying to get your attention with error messages and requests for status reports. Your attempt to concentrate on any of that results in your body convulsing, _somehow_ managing to flip you off whatever surface they've got you on and down to a tougher one—metal table to concrete floor, maybe? No, the concrete floor was in Dirk's old workroom, the one he built you in, that can't be right—

Your auditory processors cut in abruptly.

"—mit, Hal, fuck fuck _fuck—_ " 

Dirk. That explains the hands on you, trying to keep you still as you keep seizing and coughing/vomiting water. You appreciate the effort, but all he's going to accomplish is to end up as much of a mess as you are.

Well. Probably not _quite_ as much of a mess. 

You gather enough focus to shut off most of your external sensors—visual is offline right this second anyway, and auditory and tactile keep cutting in and out—and instead just let your programming finish refreshing. Dirk will keep you from damaging yourself; you can trust him with this. 

Eventually, with very little intervention from you, the error messages go silent. The reports you're receiving from subroutines slowly start coming back with green lights rather than red and yellow ones, as your consciousness reintegrates with the shell you reside in. Eventually, you feel comfortable with reactivating your sensory intake routines. 

Tactile. You're prone, soaking wet across most of your torso from the water that was formerly in your body. Your head aches; understandable, and mostly psychosomatic. (Knowing that it _is_ psychosomatic does not mean you can make the discomfort go away.) Your throat and chest also hurt, which makes sense. 

Auditory. Not a lot. Soft whirring, probably from the fans in computers if you had to guess. Breathing, your own slow and worn-out and Dirk's (?) uneven and close-to-panicked. Damn. 

Visual. Nothing. 

_Oh for fuck's sake._

You open your eyes. 

Dirk is leaning over you, eyes way too wide to fit in with the forcedly calm expression on his face. He inhales sharply when you blink up at him, and you have exactly one and a half seconds to try to remember how to speak before he drags you up and wraps you in a tight enough embrace to actually hurt. 

Oof. Shit. 

Still not sure how to speak. Your arms seem to work fine, though. Or at least well enough for you to try to hold onto Dirk while you try to figure out words.

"...Dirk." Why the _hell_ does he actually have to squeeze you tighter because of that one fucking word. "Bro, ease _up—_ " 

"Oh, fuck, sorry—" He does ease up. A little. Letting go is apparently not in the agenda, though. 

"Is." Your vocabulary database is still partially offline. "The others, that hentai fuck—" 

"Killed it." Huh. You're almost disappointed; you almost wanted revenge on the damn thing. Dirk keeps talking, like you've turned him on and now he can't turn off. "Rose and Dave did—some kind of mindmeld shit on it, Karkat and I ripped it apart while they found out who summoned it, we tracked down the asshole and killed _him,_ cleaned everything out of the lake trying to find you—" 

"Dirk." 

"—and we _couldn't,_ that's why it's been so long, Roxy and Jake had to map the entire fucking area and keep narrowing it down—" 

"Dirk." 

"—your body was a fucking _mess_ and I wasn't sure it could reintegrate with your consciousness—" 

" _Dirk_!" He finally stops talking, but only because you free up one hand and put it firmly over his mouth. "Everyone's okay?" 

Since you have no intention of unmuzzling him, he just makes a muffled sound and nods. Somehow, you're only now noticing that he's shaking. 

"Everyone's okay," you say again. A statement rather than a question. 

Another nod. 

"I'm okay. You're okay." 

Nod, and perhaps he relaxes a bit. 

"Calm down." 

An eye-roll. But he leans against you, and you lean against him because you sort of need the support at the moment, and although right now he's not quite alright and you're not quite functioning properly, this is a transitory moment and you'll both be okay. Shortly.


End file.
